Jury

This cosmopolitan Asian-American director originally studied philosophy before abandoning the field in 1997 and founding the Zukunftsmusik production company. His films look at philosophical and controversial subjects involving racial and social conflict in an attempt at tearing down the viewer’s pre-existing ideas and thus overcoming deeply rooted prejudices. Hong has explored the status of Asians within the pseudo-liberal United States (Behold the Asian: How One Becomes What One Is, 1999/2000), as well as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Iraq War. Last year, he completed his first feature-length documentary, Lessons of the Blood, which looks at Japan’s use of biological weapons during the Second World War. In 2007, Hong’s short film 731: Two Versions of Hell (2007) was awarded the main prize in the Opus Bonum section at the Ji.hlava IDFF.